San Antonio FC preseason camp begins ahead of 2018 USL season

San Antonio FC kicked off the club’s preseason camp Monday, the annual first-look at the roster constructed over the winter offseason.

Image: Kyle Mahnke / Two Ten Soccer

There are 20 players currently signed to contracts, with Managing Director Tim Holt confirming all players under contract have been announced, as reported by the Crocketteers twitter account. This does not take into account players invited to preseason camp as trialists, or other players seeking MLS contracts that could potentially land at USL teams such as NYCFC trialist Sebastien Ibeagha or NYCFC’s unsigned second round SuperDraft pick A.J. Paterson. Two of SAFC’s most well-known players, Defenders Greg Cochrane and Stephen McCarthy, both joined SAFC late in the 2016 preseason to kick off the club’s inaugural season.

After finishing second on the 2017 USL Western Conference table, SAFC was eliminated from the USL Cup Playoffs in the second round by rivals OKC Energy FC in the Alamo City. SAFC was eliminated from the 2017 U.S. Open Cup by another Oklahoma USL squad, Tulsa Roughnecks FC. Both matches saw the silver and black fall on penalties.

On the end of the season and the momentum into 2018, San Antonio FC Head Coach Darren Powell said the following to media:

When you lose on penalties you always think there’s unfinished business to take care of. We worked extremely hard last season and…both competitions we lost on penalties. So I think as a group we feel theres a little unfinished business. We’ve addressed that internally and we want to just make sure we do a little bit better, show progress, and take this team to the next level.

SAFC all time minutes leader and veteran defender Greg Cochrane had the following to say about 2017 and looking forward to 2018:

Obviously nobody wants to end their season on penalty kicks. It’s the worst way to lose. But that being said, looking at last year as a whole I think it was a really positive step forward. There’s a lot of things we can learn from and take it one step farther this year. I try not to dwell on the past too much. We look forward and take what we learned and improved on it so I think it’s going to be a real strong year this year.

The following is the squad as released to media:

The current roster brings 17 players back from the 2017 season with newcomers Mikey Lopez (NYCFC), Jose Escalante (Olimpia), and Alex Bruce (Texans SC / SAFC training squad) bringing the total up to 20. Escalante and Omar Gordon are on loan from their home clubs for the 2018 USL season.

Native Texan Mikey Lopez spoke about the club after Monday’s preseason camp session:

It’s really good coming here and seeing familiar faces and knowing that they’re already a really good family. They just embrace me as another brother. It’s a really good feeling for me knowing the family connection is really tight and really close. It’s a good feeling for me.

The club continues preseason camp this week. Our staff is already working on a piece for later this week covering the battle to make the Starting XI. You can follow along with our updates on Twitter and Instagram @TwoTenSoccer.